The 2023-2024 Wittenberg Series continues with the IBM Endowed Lecture in the Sciences featuring Britt Wray, climate and mental health specialist, as the keynote speaker at 7 p.m. Monday, Oct. 23, in Bayley Auditorium at the Barbara Deer Kuss Science Center. Her address is titled “Generation Dread.”
An author and researcher working at the forefront of climate change and mental health, Wray has written a new book titled Generation Dread: Finding Purpose in an Age of Climate Crisis, which offers an impassioned generational perspective on how to stay sane amid climate disruption. Wray was a finalist for the 2022 Governor General’s Award.
Wray is the lead of the Special Initiative of the Chair on Climate Change and Mental Health in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences of Stanford Medicine. Before launching that initiative, she was a Human and Planetary Health Postdoctoral Fellow at Stanford University's Center for Innovation in Global Health, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment, and the London School of Medicine's Centre on Climate Change and Planetary Health. She holds a doctorate in science communication from the University of Copenhagen.
Wray has advised Canadian Federal Ministers, the U.S. State Department, and multiple Fortune 500 companies. A Canadian Screen Award winner, she has hosted several podcasts, radio, and TV programs with the BBC and CBC, as well as writes Gen Dread, a newsletter about finding hope and taking meaningful action on the far side of climate grief (gendread.substack.com). Her TED talk, "How Climate Change Affects Your Mental Health," has been viewed more than 2.5 million times. She holds a Climate Psychology certificate from the California Institute of Integral Studies and is a Fellow in the Climate Health Organizing Fellowship offered by Harvard C-Change.
While on campus, Wray will meet with students and faculty during two class visits and conduct a lunch-and-learn event before her evening discussion.
The IBM Endowed Lecture in the Sciences is funded by a gift to Wittenberg from the IBM Corporation. The lectures are designed to bring distinguished scholars to campus in order to enhance the role and image of science on a liberal arts campus and to bring about a larger understanding and appreciation of science as a most crucial contemporary exercise. Additional support for this event was provided by the Faculty Endowment Fund, and the departments of chemistry, environmental science, and psychology.
The Wittenberg Series was created in 1982 during President William A. Kinnison’s tenure. Since its inception, Nobel Laureates, scientists, significant literary figures, most of America’s foremost modern dance companies, as well as hundreds of prominent psychologists, educators, economists, writers, theologians, urban planners, and historians, have visited campus to participate.
All events of The Wittenberg Series are open to the public free of charge. Doors open 30 minutes prior to the beginning of each lecture or performance. Below are further details related to each Series’ event.
2023-2024 Wittenberg Series Events:
- Thursday, Nov. 16: William A. Kinnison Endowed Lecture in History, 7 p.m., Bayley Auditorium, featuring Michael Gomez, professor of history and Middle Eastern & Islamic studies and founder, Association for the Study of the Worldwide African Diaspora (ASWAD).
- Friday, Dec. 8: Candlelight Chapel Service, Lessons and Carols for Advent & Christmas, Weaver Chapel, 7:30 p.m. with pre-service music beginning at 7 p.m.
- Monday, Jan. 15, 2024: Martin Luther King Jr. Convocation (collaboration with Diversity Advisory Committee), 11 a.m. in Weaver Chapel, featuring 2013 Wittenberg graduates Karlos L. Marshall and Moses B. Mbeseha, co-founders of The Conscious Connect.
- Monday, Feb. 19, 2024: Allen J. Koppenhaver Literary Lecture, 7 p.m., Bayley Auditorium, featuring Hanif Abdurraqib, poet, essayist, and cultural critic from Columbus, Ohio.
- Thursday, March 14, 2024: Sauer Symposium, Pastor Drew Tucker, executive director of Hopewood Outdoors Lutheran Camps and author of “4D Formation,” which focuses on vocation for young adults, at 7 p.m. in Weaver Chapel.
- Monday, March 18, 2024: Tribe for Jazz concert with saxophonist Jon Irabagon at 7 p.m. in Weaver Chapel.
- Tuesday, April 9, 2024: Leventhal Family Lecture, 7 p.m., Bayley Auditorium, featuring Eli Saslow, currently a writer at-large for the New York Times, who was formerly with the Washington Post.
For more information on the Wittenberg Series, click here. To make special arrangements or become a friend of the Wittenberg Series, contact Katie Warber at kwarber@wittenberg.edu.
